Match Fight Night!

*contented sigh* I do love Match Fight Night and this year was no exception, apart from it seems to get easier every time we do it! It probably helped that I conned Jamie into doing my refereeing so had nothing to do but chill and enjoy – ha!

Results… (first fighter named is red)

Katherine Skipper (MVD) beat Monique King (Wgtn) red-draw-draw

Eppy Davis (Wgtn) beat Jessica Sheppard (Wgtn) white-red-red

Lucy Wong (MVD) beat Simone Morgan (Wgtn) draw-red-red

Aaron George (MVD) beat Mark from over the fence red-draw-draw

Craig McKenzie (MVD) lost to Bernie Johnson (Palmy) white-white-white

Martin Fenson (MVD) drew with Benjamin Lindsay (Wgtn) draw-draw-draw

Josh Struthers (MVD) beat Darryl Smith (Wgtn) red-red-red (Josh took ‘Fighter of the Night’). Josh is 15 (90kg) and Darryl is 40 (95kg). It’s fair to say we were a little worried in the first 30 seconds because Darryl is super strong and came out big guns blazing making Josh look closer to his real age than usual! But Josh found his feet (and his knees) and turned quickly turned the fight on it’s head. He took an 8 count by Jodan Mawashi in each of rounds 2 & 3. Very good sports both fighters!

Bowen Liu (MVD) drew with Matthew Davies (Honbu) draw-draw-draw. Both boys 16yrs & around 70kg. Bowen should be really happy with this result, giving away several years training and a lot of experience. Everyone’s talking about how much fun Bowen is to spar with and it translated to a solid performance on the mat.

Chris Eades (MVD) beat Regan Lawrence (Palmy) ippon in round 1 by Jodan Mawashi. To be fair there was two years between Chris at 16 and Regan at 14 but those Palmy boys are always hard as and the word is Regan pushes them all around the place. Regan did look younger but he came out with big guns so credit where it’s due Chris didn’t waste any time bringing out his notorious left jodan mawashi for a very quick ippon. Just like his big brother! (Yay!)

Chetan Ranchhod (MVD) beat Chris Eades’ mate Callum (Seido) red-draw-red. Cracker of a fight. Callum is all class and gave away a year and 10kg to Chetan (damn Chetan, you lose 20kg & you’re still the fat guy!) This fight was more fun to watch if you were aware that Chetan has gone from fighting using one technique – granted, a very nice shita tsuki! He should get the ‘Fancy Fighter’ award for switching, feinting, dodging and pulling out every technique imaginable including 3 Shihan Takiwa overhand rights (in a row)… and a jumping mawashi geri! It was a great match because Callum has a big tool kit as well. You’ve got to see the video!

Jamie’s mate Sam (Combat Room) lost to John Fow (Palmy) draw-white-white. All credit to Sam for giving away head punches (he’s a kickboxer). Sam’s only done a very little Kyokushin sparring so it was a big ask to fight a big guy with big guns who has gone toe to toe with Warren Gabb! I only saw one tiny head punch pop out which was less than some of the Kyokushin fighters! Well done!

Richard Parry (MVD) lost to Daniel Middlemiss (Timaru) white-draw-draw. A nice fight by two gentlemen. Daniel’s a big puncher and it took a while for Richard to look totally comfortable with that but he did and it became a fair trade. Loving Richards jodan mawashis – not bad for an old dude!

Zeke Hudspith (MVD) lost to Brian (Wanganui) white-white-white. Geeze Brian’s got some guns. In fact it was a bit of a theme for the night. MVD vs big punchers but Zeke closed up and Brian didn’t give him any room to come back.

Thelvin Cabezas (MVD) drew with Zane (Wanganui) draw-draw-draw. (Thelvin was awarded Best Technical Fighter). Hmmm…. least said here would probably be best! I should let the DVD speak for itself but what the heck, it’s my blog! Thelvin gave away 10kg and Zane had massive punches so it was very apparent when they found flesh but I can’t wait to count how many times Thelvin hit Zane’s buttons in the first round at least! Not taking anything away from Zane because it was a great match but, Thelvin’s mum in Costa Rica, for the record, you can tell your girlfriends it was a clear win to Thelvin and he was a star. ;-)